In the classroom we have a Viewsonic 20" CRT, located in the audio corner, near the working PC. A group of us would like to purpose this for the MAME arcade project. We've put a sticker on it to claim for this project.

If you own or have otherwise purposed this CRT for something else, please post. Otherwise we'd like to take it for the MAME project.

We're targeting a usage date of 9/1; please post before then if you have a prior claim on this monitor.

Tore apart one of the "broken" vacuums. One of the brushes was stuck so I cleaned it up with some sand paper and put it back together. Still needs a new cord and cleaning. Tested it out on the small conference room. I don't know if its the dirt that has been built up or if the motor is running hotter, but it kinda smells. It doesn't help that I'm allergic to dust mites and by the time I got it back together I was sneezing up a storm.

I was at a surplus store supplies place (next to Litton Paper by the Mpls. Farmer's Market on Lyndale), and found a large, used convex mirror of the type you'd see in department stores. Metal and sturdy, but without mounting arm and hardware. It looked to be 3 feet in diameter.

This would be extremely useful at many places in the Hack Factory. The surplus place would charge $30. Brandon said I'd need approval from a shop manager to make this purchase and apply our Springboard for the Arts non-profit ID for a discount.

Can any of you afford $30 out of your budget for this? Or does anyone (shop manager or not) want to pitch in a donation to purchase this?

Sounds like an extremely good bargain for something that would add great value to the space!

mcsteve wrote:Can you give an example use case for this mirror? I'm not picturing it.

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Place it in the upper corner of wood shop or metal shop areas; shop managers and others can observe activity happening behind them. Place it angled between maiin shop area and wood shop; people in either area can see others approaching or leaving. I'm sure there are other locations where it would be useful.

Thanks to everyone who helped out with the quarterly cleaning effort at the Hack Factory! It's looking pretty spiffy!

Yesterday I continued with the classroom area and did some mopping.

I re-powered the network switch there on the electronics bench side, which had been switched off via the outlet strip. We have wired Internet again on that side.

I also resurrected the PC that had once been used for the MakerBot, as there is a different PC used for it presently. It sits near the audio equipment. I did all Ubuntu 11 system updates. The machine is a bit of a slug, but can at least be used for browsing or mp3/streaming audio source for the shop sound system.

A few days ago I was able to find an audio cord that worked to connect the PC audio out to the stereo/radio amplifier. PC out is connected to the aux input and this patch is visible in front. To use PC output, all a person needs to do is dial the input selector to external/aux. I've added direction to a sticker on the stereo.

Related to this, does anyone know if shop speakers have been, or can be, configured independently from the classroom speakers to both produce mono output, since they are each stationed now in different areas? Could someone configure this?